The Road to May 12th
Posted 12 years ago on May 4, 2012, 11:56 p.m. EST by OccupyWallSt
¨You can cut all the flowers, but you cannot stop the coming of Spring.¨
–Pablo Neruda
via May12.net:
Rise up on May 12th, 2012 - We are the 99%
On the 15th of October 2011 we took to the streets in over 1000 cities in 82 countries. We got organized and took the first steps on the road to dignity and global change. That was more than six months ago yet we continue to have to raise our voices to make politicians and bankers understand that they in no way represent us. We are united in our demands: the welfare of the 99% must be respected.
Governments only represent us if they follow the will of the vast majority, not just the privileged few.We are united, we are everywhere, we are where you least expect us.
We demand, firmly but without violence: social justice, wealth distribution and an ethic of commons. We condemn poverty, inequality, environmental devastation and corruption as tools of subjugation by the powerful on society.
We will not stop until we achieve our objectives: the 99% will take to the streets again and again until we have a say in the world in which we live. We want global change. Let's turn the streets into the world's biggest loudspeaker on the 12th of May.
Because we are the 99%, we are not owned by politicians and bankers. Take to the streets on May 12th!
Join us.
To all the naysayers that spend their time stalking the occupy movement, and tracking every march assembled, please understand: your hateful words cannot prosper against our joy. At the core, we are happy. Every protest is a celebration. We cannot be broken. The kids are getting out of school this week. The occupation will be here to support them. Our numbers will grow. The next generation of teachers, scientists and legislators will grow from a collective need to provide for all peoples of the world and undo the damage we have inflicted upon our precious globe.
Thank you for continuing to fight for the rights of those who don't know they have lost them.
If ever existed a reason to fight, it always was the same: moving forward, evolution. The actual system is obsolete, as its failure has demonstrated. It won't stand for much longer, and today pioneers have the opportunity to create a better one. A system based on global consciousness, respectful with our species and the planet we live in, together, as one big family. Never give up.
I'm very supportive of OWS, though not sure what this is asking to do exactly on May 12th... Please read works of Gene Sharp (From Dictatorship to Democracy). Occupy is great, however does need to go beyond symbolic actions/protests, or in addition to, and get the word out on THOSE actions more, as well. For example, please get behind and advance raising the minimum wage to $10/hour and get more and more people and organizations out and on board with that, and, behind demanding constitutional conventions to overturn Citizens United and corporate personhood, as well! Those issues, I believe, need to be the next focus. Constitutional conventions need a lot of support from the public. I'm with the movement and am supporting it and really want it to lead to reform!... Thanks! Please keep up the good work...
-Munderlarkst, Michael White, of Occupy Wall Street News and Videos: http://paper.li/f-1319837259 -- a daily on-line paper to keep up with and support the Occupy movement!
Can OWS still use Facebook?
I mean Facebook is on Wall Street now, we'd be supporting what we're against.
http://anothernyc.org/
From the guys that brought you May Day (http://www.maydaynyc.org) comes support for #12M15.
Global change, yes! And workers' self-management and democracy on all levels in society is what we should strive for.
Occupy Your Workplace!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jRy5ZIYZok
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can anyone provide details on what is going on in NYC, if anything? Join the May 12 people where? to do what? I assume there will be a demonstration but I can't find anything about one. It's probably staring me right in the face...
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I love at 3:59 with the young man hugging the police officer.
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The BEST protest is a MASS MEDITATION send a peaceful message of LOVE AND TO REDISCOVER OUR SPIRITUALITY that was taken away many years ago. They changed our DNA ( 95% is junk) to lower your conscious and imprison us here on this planet. They drugged us with sex, money, cars, music,MOVIES to make us forgot we are very powerful spiritual beings.They deprived us from other civilizations and technology They had us slaughter each other for thous years. FREE YOURSELF. MEDITATE and Ask for the LIGHT THE ENERGY Reactivate your DNA. organize MASS MEDITATION.Join our facebook group and spread the word..turn those protests in mass meditations... THIS IS OUR ONLY WAY OUT! LET'S DO IT
Though this sounds like an interesting premise for a science fiction novel...
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The BEST protest is a MASS MEDITATION send a peaceful message of LOVE AND TO REDISCOVER OUR SPIRITUALITY that was taken away many years ago. They changed our DNA ( 95% is junk) to lower your conscious and imprison us here on this planet. They drugged us with sex, money, cars, music,MOVIES to make us forgot we are very powerful spiritual beings.They deprived us from other civilizations and technology They had us slaughter each other for thous years. FREE YOURSELF. MEDITATE and Ask for the LIGHT THE ENERGY Reactivate your DNA. organize MASS MEDITATION.Join our facebook group and spread the word..turn those protests in mass meditations... THIS IS OUR ONLY WAY OUT! LET'S DO IT
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Our financial system has not failed, it is exactly as it was set up to be.
Indeed, therein lies the problem.
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Do you want Justice!! Do you want to be liberated! Get a job! Enjoy life. You guys are dreamy. I deliver pizza I am 53. I chose to do drugs and drink that is why I am 53 and deliver pizza. It's not the Republicans fault (I am a Conservative who's hobby is economics). about 15 years ago I figured I can make a little money by piggy-backing on a corporation that makes money. And they like you to make money. I opened up a ROTH IRA and put in $100 a month for the last 15 years or so. After 15 years I had put in over $15,000 of my own money and with dividends and capital gains (that means profits) I have just over $36,000. I have my own little apartment nice and clean. I quit drinking and dope 15 years ago in August by the way. Boy did my life improve!! I have all the trappings of a good little right wing capitalist. A decent car a nice T.V. (two of them, both HDTV. I eat good have good friends and you know what?? I don't have to sit around and bitch about how messed up this country is. You can do what you want but there is no such thing as a free lunch. I am happy. I wish you guys the same. But complaining and wearing clown outfits and breaking windows??? I got no time for that. I feel for you but at the same time don't ruin it for the majority of people who are doing just fine and looking at you people with pity and anger. Get a life... it's out there but you must put an effort into it. Good luck. I will pray for all of you.
Yet, I'm willing to bet that, as we the people who are making history and inspiring you to write, comment and let yourself be heard in a people's forum like this one, are MORE happy than you because our legitimate anger morphs into something more beautiful than you can imagine: We are pushing back our class enemies against the wall and with a sustained effort might just push them out into the dust bin of history. We are proud to be fighting for an America freed of corporate greed and exploitation.
Take your budget and give yourself two children. You love them and want the best for them. When they get sick, you want to take them to the doctor. When they get injured playing sports, you want to take them to the hospital. When they get older, you want them to go to college and pursue higher learning in whatever discipline that lights them afire. You want them to be able to not only pursue their dreams, but to be able to work and have enough financial security that they can too start a family and support the dreams of their children. Two children for you and a spouse is maintaining the current population, neither increasing nor decreasing it, and yet your budget cannot support it.
I have dreams that are so much more than your HDTVs, lemmys1983. Since a child I have dreamed of seeing the Earth from the Moon. I dream that for my future children too. I dream that the Earth they get to see is beautiful and vibrant, both in the environment and in the human race that is healthy and sustained. When you pray for me, do not do so out of pity, but out of love for me, and a love for mankind.
SHAME ON YOU! Occupy Wall Street doesn't unite America, but causes division between the working class and those that want a hand out. THE GOVERNMENT DOESN'T MAKE MONEY. They tax! I am paying over 50% of my income in taxes to support 50 Senators making over $200,000 a year (4x that of us average folks), special healthcare and retirement (after 2 years their whole salary), over a $1,000,000 (to support 18+ staff member) x 50 Senators... This is wasteful and unjustified!
ALL of our Senators are RICH! How can they represent the people when they are elitist and feel they're above the working class? They make laws that they're above, don't read, and then push down onto us to drive their own agenda (and line their pockets with additional funds). They disguise social programs under the premise of helping others, but spend millions for their own special interests. They spent billions of our hard-earned money and have NOTHING to show for it except more devastation.
We have a broken education, banking, social security, and prison systems to name a few... Everything the government touches turns to crap! And now they're getting involved in our healthcare?! Just think, we can have healthcare that runs like the DMV.
The Congress and President represent are stealing our money! This should be a civil service. Serve your country! Be proud! I would happily take a seat in Senate without a salary because I believe in America. I believe in freedom! I believe in civil liberties for all!
Let's take a stand together! Wall Street ISN'T the problem. Wall Street represents free market, capitalism, free trade, growth, wealth, and innovation. The government gets involved, adds regulations and laws (80,000 pages of new laws each year), and destroys everything they touch.
The government is too big! We have corrupt politicians stealing our money. They give themselves pay raises EVERY year! Help me in sending a message to our politicians:
http://letters2congress.rallycongress.com/1377/tell-congress-to-take-a-pay-cut/
Let's unite TOGETHER to send a message to our politicians. May God bless America! God bless our freedom!
I would like to invite you to compare the American healthcare system with that of the Japanese. Though not perfect, in healthcare the free market is more regulated in Japan and therefore capable of keeping the price more affordable.
Stand with American workers, not the corp criminals who crashed the world economy! Support OWS!! We fight for American workers, The 99%. Vote out big finance lovin republicans!!!
Don't stand with corporate criminals?
I guess we better stop using Facebook, they're part of Wall Street, the thing we're supposed to occupy.
Nah! use what you like. you agitate regardless. disregard any hypocrite accusations. those critics just want to silence you. Support OWS. vote out bug business lovin republicans!
This part of your comment is pure crap:
SHAME ON YOU! Occupy Wall Street doesn't unite America, but causes division between the working class and those that want a hand out.
This part is not:
We have corrupt politicians stealing our money. They give themselves pay raises EVERY year! Help me in sending a message to our politicians:
http://letters2congress.rallycongress.com/1377/tell-congress-to-take-a-pay-cut/
Let's unite TOGETHER to send a message to our politicians. May God bless America! God bless our freedom!
I signed the petition and added some of my own thoughts to the letter.
Your Letter to Congress
http://letters2congress.rallycongress.com/1377/tell-congress-to-take-a-pay-cut/
Dan, thanks for taking action on behalf of USA-Wake Up Call. Your messages are on the way.
An individual copy of your letter will be sent to each official:
May 5, 2012
Dear Representative ---------, Dear Senator -------------, Dear Senator ----------,
As the economy continues to lean closer toward a depression and Americans are losing their jobs and homes we ask that our elected officials do their part to help spread the wealth.
We want all members of congress to take an immediate 25% pay cut and that a wage-freeze begin immediately. This wage-freeze should remain in effect until the economy has completely recovered.
We want our elected members of congress to begin paying into social security instead of their privately funded retirement program.
We want our elected members of congress to pay their own way to and from work and for their meals (like the rest of us) instead of using a government expense account. This should also include using your own vehicle versus a government car.
These are hard times in America and your jobs are secure at least until the next election. Ours are not. We are losing our homes and forced to pay into social security and being a public servant should not equate to being an elitist.
Yes - they should take a pay cut. Yes - they should pay into SS.rnYes - they should have to provide for their own Health Insurance. Yes- they should have to live the same conditions as the major portion of the population of the middle and lower class. Maybe then they will start to get in touch with reality.
Sincerely,
"We will not stop until we achieve our objectives"
And you people wonder why others routinely state; '#0WS does not have a coherent message?' When would we know when "social justice, wealth distribution and an ethic of commons" has been achieved? How do we know when to stop, when demands like 'social justice' are merely Communist chimeras with no true meaning?
How deluded must one be, to refer to the involuntary confiscation of another American's personal earnings/property as 'social justice'?
That is not economic justice, social justice or any other kind of justice. In fact, it is the opposite of justice and freedom alike. It is a contradiction of our Founding Principles and of the United States America itself.
"How do we know when to stop, when demands like 'social justice' are merely Communist chimeras with no true meaning?"
Honestly I don't think we will ever be able to stop, not in my life time anyway, and that is part of the reason for the goal. We are an ever growing and evolving species and as our level of intelligence continues to grow so must our understanding of social justice. There are a lot of things broken in our world and they all will need attention at some point.
"How deluded must one be, to refer to the involuntary confiscation of another American's personal earnings/property as 'social justice'?"
Guess we should get rid of that whole taxes thing then? How deluded must you be to already have the system your decrying in place your entire life and not see it right in front of you. I don't ever remember getting a say whether or not I wanted to pay taxes and I certainly did not tell them to use my money to keep a failing self-destructive financial system running. So to me it looks like taking from some to benefit others is pretty much what this government is all about, only thing I don't see so much in our history is them giving the money to the people who need it.
Ultimately I don't have all the answers, and I can't tell you that the occupy movement is going to accomplish everything we want. What it is going to accomplish and already has is to connect a new generation of free thinking individuals with the previous generations who are not merely content to watch the world from comfort of their living rooms and the safety of their TV's. If anything it has given me hope that I am not the only person who cares and is not content simply to play the how much can I buy before I die game. Even when this struggle is long and painful (which anything worth struggling for usually is) we will not have to go it alone because of connections we have made.
Much love and solidarity from Boston.
more like the LT1% and shrinking .... statistically insignificant outside the group fantasy mind. you do not speak for the actual 99%, only yourselves ... and embarrass and annoy the rest of us. we are watching you fade away as your internal propaganda pieces get increasingly ludicrous and amusing. nobody reads the history anymore, nobody learns from it
The 1% like to live in fantasy thinking that the people will never wake up but in fact more and more people are waking up. The number of people under the control of the 1% is shrinking while the number of people supporting OWS is growing.
Flowers can only bloom when they are spared form the blade of egalitarianism.
We need an iron gardener.
what does that mean? How does that help? Explain it to me. A poem? Really? That's the uniting fire? GEEZ you guys are dreamy.
were you supposd to show your power on May 1st on the day without the 99%?
Such a big failer that was that its not even been talked about any more.
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